Federal judge rejects Michigan Republicans’ effort to decertify election results

A federal judge on Monday rejected Michigan Republicans’ effort to have their state’s election results decertified.

Judge Linda Parker denied a request for an injunction submitted by a group of President Trump’s electors against state officials, finding that their lawsuit is “far from likely to succeed in this matter.”

“In fact, this lawsuit seems to be less about achieving the relief Plaintiffs seek—as much of that relief is beyond the power of this Court—and more about the impact of their allegations on People’s faith in the democratic process and their trust in our government,” Parker wrote in her 36-page decision. “Plaintiffs ask this Court to ignore the orderly statutory scheme established to challenge elections and to ignore the will of millions of voters.  This, the Court cannot, and will not, do.” 

The lawsuit against Michigan’s governor and other state officials was filed the day before Thanksgiving, days after Michigan’s vote count — which showed Biden ahead by more than 150,000 votes — had been certified.

The complaint alleged widespread malfeasance from elections officials and voting fraud, and asked the court to order the governor to “transmit certified election results that state that President Donald Trump is the winner of the election.”

Gregory Rohl, an attorney representing the plaintiffs, told The Hill that they will weigh whether to appeal Parker’s decision.

“Her opinion, in essence, is a cut and paste of the briefs filed in opposition to our motion as expected,” Rohl said in an email. “It was always envisioned however that ultimate review of this voter fraud issue would be done by [the Supreme Court]. Since many successful in-roads have been made by similar filings across the country, I need to meet with my team to decide whether we move forward with an appeal. I am personally prepared to do so and believe all voters are entitled to our deliberative attempts to preserve our Democratic Process against corruption of any kind.”

Parker, an Obama appointee, on Monday indicated that she was not swayed by many of the unsupported allegations that the GOP electors made and said that their lawsuit came too late to address any elections practices they take issue with. 

“If Plaintiffs had legitimate claims regarding the manner by which ballots were processed and tabulated on or after Election Day, they could have brought the instant action on Election Day or during the weeks of canvassing that followed—yet they did not,” the judge wrote.

“If Plaintiffs had legitimate concerns about the election machines and software, they could have filed this lawsuit well before the 2020 General Election—yet they sat back and did nothing,” Parker added.

–Updated at 10:38 a.m.